Virginia Nichols answers “What is the connection between the entire...”

Aphro Shenachena asked this question about Pachinko:

What is the connection between the entire novel and pachinko?

Virginia Nichols I wondered this question as I read, and these two passages (from paperback issue) resonated for me on how Pachinko is like life:

…Mozasu believed that …moreI wondered this question as I read, and these two passages (from paperback issue) resonated for me on how Pachinko is like life:

…Mozasu believed that life was like this game where the player could adjust the dials yet also expect the uncertainty of factors he couldn’t control. He understood why his customers wanted to play something that looked fixed but which also left room for randomness and hope.
pp. 292-3

Every morning, Mozasu and his men tinkered with the machines to fix the outcomes – there could only be a few winners and a lot of losers. And yet we played on, because we had hope that we might be the lucky ones. How could you get angry at the ones who wanted to be in the game? Etsuko had failed in this important way – she had not taught her children to hope, to believe in the perhaps absurd possibility that they might win. Pachinko was a foolish game, but life was not. p. 406
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